I heard about two suicides. I heard about one yesterday and one the day before. Both were neighbors or acquaintances of Word of Lifers. One was a 40-something single woman, the other was a 17 year old boy. Sad, sad, sad. Demons love suicide. They come to steal, kill and destroy and suicide is their coup de gras.
In 1873 the great Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky published his novel, Demons. Demons started out to be a political pamphlet and ended up becoming an 800 page novel. Demons was Dostoevsky’s examination of the nihilistic, atheistic worldview that was fermenting among revolutionary minded young people at the time. Dostoevsky knew that a Russian revolution was inevitable. He himself had been a conspirator in a failed revolution in his youth and was imprisoned in a Siberian labor camp for five years as a result. It was during his Siberian imprisonment that Dostoevsky became a Christian. Dostoevsky hoped for a spiritual revolution that would transform Russia, but by the 1870’s he foresaw that it would not be — that instead of New Testament Christianity providing the vision for the transformation of Russia, the coming revolution would be driven by nihilism and atheism.
Demons was Dostoevsky’s prophetic warning to the Russian people. Dostoevsky was a seer who foretold how Russia would suffer from a revolution founded on atheism. Malcolm Muggeridge said that everything that happened in Russia in the 20th century was predicted by Dostoevsky in Demons. Muggeridge also said, “Dostoevsky was a truly prophetic figure, plunging down frenziedly into his kingdom of hell on earth and arriving at Golgotha. He had tremendous insight into the future and foresaw the world we have today.”
Dostoevsky gave his novel the title, Demons, precisely because the demons do not appear in the book and if Dostoevsky had not identified the demons in the title, the reader might very well overlook them. But the demons are there. They lurk in the shadows. They are found in the strongholds of nihilistic and atheistic thought, in the spiritual void of the human heart, in the distortion of the human soul corrupted into a monster capable of great evil.
About halfway through the book a group of the young atheistic revolutionaries encounter a suicide. Their reaction betrays the demonic influence they are subject to. I want to share it with you…
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When our party had crossed the bridge and reached the hotel, someone suddenly announced that in one of the rooms of the hotel they had just found a guest who had shot himself and were waiting for the police. At once the suggestion was made that we should go and look at the suicide. The idea met with approval. The ladies had never seen a suicide. I remember one of them said, “Everything’s so boring, we can’t be squeamish about entertainment as long as it’s diverting.” Only a few of them remained outside. The rest went trooping down the dirty corridor.
The door of the room was open and they did not prevent our going in to look at the suicide. He was quite a young lad, not more than nineteen. He must have been very good-looking, with thick blonde hair. The body was already stiff and his white young face looked like marble. On the table lay a note, in his handwriting, to the effect that no one was to blame for his death, that he had killed himself because he had squandered four hundred rubles. In its four lines there were three misspellings.
A fat gentleman, evidently an acquaintance, who had been staying in the hotel on some business of his own, was particularly distressed about it. From his words it appeared that the boy had been sent by his family, his widowed mother, his sisters and aunts, to the town in order that, under the supervision of a female relation in the town, he might purchase and take home with him various articles for the trousseau of his eldest sister, who was going to be married. The family had, with fearful sighs, entrusted him with the four hundred rubles, the savings of ten years, and had sent him on his way with exhortations, prayers and signs of the cross. The boy had till then been well-behaved and trustworthy.
Arriving three days ago, he had not gone to his relatives, but had checked into the hotel and gone straight to the club in the hope of finding in some back room a traveling gambler or at least a card game. But that evening there was no gambling going on. Going back to the hotel around midnight he asked for champagne, Havana cigars and ordered a supper of six or seven courses. But the champagne made him drunk and the cigar made him throw up, so that when the food was brought he did not touch it, but went to bed almost unconscious.
Waking next morning as fresh as an apple, he went at once to the gypsies’ camp in a village beyond the river, which he had heard of the day before at the club. He did not reappear at the hotel for two days. At last, at five in the afternoon, he returned drunk, went to bed, and slept till ten that night. On waking he asked for a cutlet, a bottle of Chateau d’Yquem, some grapes, paper and ink, and the bill. No one noticed anything special about him; he was quiet, calm and friendly.
He must have shot himself at about midnight, though it was strange that no one had heard the shot and his absence was noticed only today at one in the afternoon, when, after knocking in vain, they broke down the door. The bottle of Chateau d’Yquem was half empty; there was half a plateful of grapes left too. The shot had been fired from a little three-chambered revolver, straight into the heart. Very little blood had flowed. The revolver had dropped from his hand onto the carpet. The boy himself was reclining on a sofa in the corner. Death must have been instantaneous. There was no trace of the anguish of death in the face; the expression was serene, almost happy, he need only have lived.
All our party stared at him with greedy curiosity. The ladies gazed in silence, the men distinguished themselves by their wit and presence of mind. One observed that it was the best way out of it and that the boy could not have done anything more sensible; another observed that he had had a good time if only for a moment. A third suddenly blurted out, “Why have we got so many people hanging or shooting themselves lately, as though we have lost our roots, as though the floor has suddenly given way under our feet?” This raisonneur was given cold looks. One who prided himself in playing the fool took a bunch of grapes from the plate; another, laughing, followed his example, and a third stretched out his hand for the Chateau d’Yquem. But he was stopped by the chief of police who arrived and ordered everyone out of the room. For the remainder of the day, the general merriment, laughter and playful chatter were twice as lively.
From Demons, Part II, chapter 5
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This passage of Demons made a deep impression on me. It’s sort of a tragic version of the parable of the prodigal son. It’s the demonic version of the prodigal son. It’s what demons hope to be the fate of every prodigal son, every prodigal daughter.
A few observations…
One of the ladies in the group remarks,
Everything’s so boring, we can’t be squeamish about entertainment as long as it’s diverting.
This is the ungodly and demonic abuse of entertainment. Life disconnected from God will inevitably become boring. That leaves the person with three choices…
1. Connect with the living God — the source of all life and true passion.
2. Acquiesce to the boredom and live a listless life.
3. Seek increasing perversions of entertainment in a desperate effort to divert the boredom.
The nihilistic narrator was so callous and devoid of human compassion that what he noticed from the boy’s suicide note was the three spelling errors.
Dostoevsky gives us a very dark comedic view of sin when the wayward boy first begins to indulge his lusts:
Going back to the hotel around midnight he asked for champagne, Havana cigars and ordered a supper of six or seven courses. But the champagne made him drunk and the cigar made him throw up, so that when the food was brought he did not touch it, but went to bed almost unconscious.
The boy thinks he’s having a good time living the party life. But he’s drunk, puking, passing out and unable to enjoy the legitimate pleasure of good food. This is the nature of sin.
Finally the boy wakes up. But unlike the prodigal son who came to himself and returned home, this prodigal son makes a different choice:
On waking he asked for a cutlet, a bottle of Chateau d’Yquem, some grapes, paper and ink, and the bill.
“…and the bill.” Those words are haunting. He’s had what he thought would be fun, but now he’s got to pay the bill. Sin will always take you further than you want to go, charge you more than you want to pay, keep you longer than you want to stay.
The shot had been fired…straight into the heart.
Indeed. In the end sin is always a bullet to the heart.
…he need only have lived.
Those words bring tears to my eyes. Now I’m thinking about the 40-something woman and that 17 year old boy. They need only have lived.
Then three of the men make comments. One says the boy did the most sensible thing. No! Another says at least he had a good time, if only for a moment. Utter foolishness! But then one of the young atheists has a moment of clarity, for a moment he escapes the demonic shadow over his mind; the raisonneur:
Why have we got so many people hanging or shooting themselves lately, as though we have lost our roots, as though the floor has suddenly given way under our feet?
Disconnectedness and baselessness (no roots and the floor giving way) are alternative ways of describing meaninglessness, which is the inevitable result of life without God, and the raisonneur begins to realize this. But he is given cold looks from the rest of his company.
What was the effect of this suicide upon the young nihilists?
For the remainder of the day, the general merriment, laughter and playful chatter were twice as lively.
Demons.
Heavenly Father, open our eyes to the prodigals all around us who are facing the bill of sin and think there is no way out. Use us to help these beloved prodigal sons and daughters find their way home to the Father’s house. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Jesus pays the bill.
Jesus took the bullet.
Jesus is the way home.
Jesus is the solid rock beneath our feet.
Jesus is the One who gives life…life worth living.
BZ
